


taming entropy

by monarchs



Category: Harry Potter - J. K. Rowling, The Social Network (2010)
Genre: Alternate Universe - Harry Potter Setting, Alternate Universe - Library, Hogwarts Eighth Year, M/M, Post-War, Sentient Hogwarts
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-09-17
Updated: 2019-09-17
Packaged: 2020-10-20 13:07:06
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,737
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/20675873
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/monarchs/pseuds/monarchs
Summary: The war changed many things, but this was only the beginning for Mark.





	taming entropy

**Author's Note:**

  * For [sundays](https://archiveofourown.org/users/sundays/gifts), [almostmagic](https://archiveofourown.org/users/almostmagic/gifts).

> Song drabble exchange with [sundays](https://archiveofourown.org/users/sundays). Prompt was: libraries (prompted by [almostmagic](https://archiveofourown.org/users/almostmagic)!)
> 
> Haha, I swear I know how to write AUs other than HP AU...

Mark got admitted to Hogwarts as an eighth year. It was after Umbridge, after Snape, after the war, after education reforms, after Dark wizards disappeared from the corners of Knockturn Alley like will-o-the-wisps in the Forbidden Forest.

He had once been a Mudblood. Mocked, used, and abused. But now that a Muggleborn was amongst the heroes of the war, life was a little different.

He was given things he never thought he could have. Some respect, an admission letter, a full scholarship, a little owl prone to colds (Hermes), new clothes, quills, books. Even a wand, except he’d misplaced it soon after its acquisition, because he was so used to getting by without one.

He'd never been to Hogwarts before. Even on his way there, there were moments when he thought he'd wake up and find it all to be a dream. 

But it hadn't been a dream. Everything was real. Like:

The hidden platform at King’s Cross, the rattle of carts and cages and trunks that refused to levitate, tides of students coming and ebbing, their silhouettes in the glass that separated the car from the hall. 

And then: the scenic view on the Express that extended into the horizon, the thestrals that pulled them to the edge of the black lake, the adrenaline that coursed through him once he stepped over the threshold of the castle, candles lit with ancient magic, the smell of genuine pumpkin juice in the air.

The feel of a warm bed, and a pillow soft as snow.

(It was like rediscovering life, magic, and hope.)  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
Still, though not to his surprise, he was mostly left out.

His classmates kept their distances, gave him wary looks. It wasn’t because of his acerbic comments, or his cold reservedness, or his green tie (because house discrimination had supposedly died with the war.) Or at least, it wasn't only because of those things.

It was because of his magic. 

It was feral, untamed. Used to the streets, used to deception, used to being stabbed in the back. 

It wasn’t made to be contained indoors, within the sophisticated decor of ornate frames and stately rooms and enchanted medieval armours, or the sleek veil of magic that drifted close to the ceiling of the Great Hall.

In his first week, his magic had made wooden desks branch out, encaging classmates who spoke behind his back. The following week saw his magic turning quills into blades pointed at someone who was about to hex him. And then the next week, he had shattered all the glass vials in Potions class, when someone had murmured, "I heard Zuckerberg was homeless."  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
So he kept his distance too.

He'd sit at tall windows in deserted hallways, reading books he'd already read, watching from the corner of his eye Professor McGonagall looking at him from the window of another tower, with both stern kindness and sympathetic wariness, the way she did when she had first picked him off the streets. 

There were only few wizards who had his kind of temperamental magic core. One of them, and the most famous of them, had been Tom Riddle. Mark knew about him, almost everything there was to know - he had read all the books at Flourish and Blotts (where recent bestsellers were chronicles of Riddle’s life and death) back when Mark worked there as an underpaid shelf stocker. (But unlike Riddle, Mark wasn't really into taking over the world, or revenge, or whatever it was that motivated the Dark Lord.)

Mark liked the company of books, if anything. Sentient ones especially. So it was natural that he stayed in the Hogwarts Library most of the time. It was the only place he felt at home, though home was such a far away concept to him nowadays.  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
The castle had undergone some changes after the war, perhaps out of grief. What had once been an ordinary school library was now sinuous and labyrinth-like, and students stayed close to the main entrance so they wouldn’t get lost, accio'd whatever they needed from there. Even Madame Pince didn't wander too far if she could help it. 

Mark didn’t really mind, getting lost in there. He was good with winding paths anyways, used to being alone in god forsaken alleys full of no one.

The fifty-sixth row was his personal sanctuary. It had a corner, with a stained glass window with a windowsill, looking out at the forest. The books in that row were mostly inoffensive, domestic. The topics ranged from sleep spells to calming draughts to abandoned researches on Rememberalls. 

They didn’t rile up when he passed them, not the way some other books did, because of his magic. They seemed to like him quite a lot too, enjoyed his company, perhaps the same way he enjoyed theirs. 

Everything became routine before he realized time was passing. Winter came and the holidays rolled in, and people were scarce because they were mostly on their way back home. 

So it was surprising, when Mark found Eduardo Saverin (Hufflepuff, eighth year, popular Keeper, tall, lean, crazy hair, eyes the size of the moon) wandering around the fifty-fifth row, head tilted, frowning at book titles, whispering to himself nervously, "_The Art of Baking Charms, The Art of Baking Charms_,..." 

Mark looked at him from the other side of the bookcase, wondering if he should speak. He knew where the book was - and it was sleeping, which was perhaps the reason why Saverin couldn't accio it. 

"Shit," Saverin said, before he started sobbing. 

Mark took a step back, feeling a little out of his element. The floor creaked betrayingly under his foot. 

Saverin looked in Mark's direction and their eyes locked, in the gap between the books and the shelf.

Mark could feel his magic prickle. The back of his neck itched, and he didn't know whether to look away, or stop breathing, or. 

Saverin wiped the tears from the corners of his eyes and then, with a voice raspier than what Mark was used to. when they were in class (they shared a lot of classes together, he just realized), Saverin murmured, "Zuckerberg?"

Mark didn't really know what to respond with. "Are you lost or what?" he asked, feeling his lack of tact only after he'd spoken.

Saverin winced, but looked around as if he was prompted to. Mark stared hard at Saverin's nape.

"I guess," Saverin said, turning back.

"Not something to cry over," Mark mumbled.

"That's not what I was--" Saverin started but cut himself short. "Are you lost too?"

Mark scoffed. 

Saverin worried his lip, then moved towards the end of the row, so he could come around to Mark's row. 

"I'm looking for a book..." he explained vaguely.

Mark snapped his fingers to wake said book, and waved his hand to levitate _The Art of Baking Charms_ to Saverin. It flew towards him in a brusque movement.

"Oh," Saverin said, mildly bewildered. 

Most people were, when they saw wandless _and_ wordless magic.

And a giant book thrown at them.

"You're welcome," Mark said, dryly.

"Right-- thanks," Saverin started, looking a little everywhere, unsure whether he was supposed to leave (it was clear he didn't really know his way out, however) or not. He looked down at the cover of his book. "How did you kno-- Um, are you staying at Hogwarts too, for the holidays?" He was flustered, as if he just remembered that Mark had caught Saverin whispering to himself, and crying.

Mark softened his expression. "Yeah," he answered.

Saverin leaned onto the windowsill. Looking around."Cosy corner," he commented.

Mark shrugged, said, "yeah."

There was room for two at the windowsill, so Mark sat next to Saverin. Saverin made room, but otherwise didn't flinch from him.

"I'm Eduardo. Saverin. Um," he said.

Mark nodded. "Mark," he murmured back, gaze on their shadows extended on the ground, a wintery sunset warm on their backs.

And that was how they met.  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
Eighth years all lived in one dorm, separate from younger students. Putting adults of all houses into one dormitory was supposed to be some grand political gesture, but then again, they were adults, and one's house mattered less and less now. 

There wasn't anyone else in their dorm, as expected. Mark and Eduardo ("don't call me Saverin. It makes me think of my father") decided to sleep in the common room, keep each other company, even if in silence.

Eduardo Floo'd his mother in the evenings, fire cracking, light flickering on his face, and Mark would watch, sat on an armchair close to the fireplace, but out of Mrs. Saverin's sight. He wouldn't realize this until much later, but maybe it was these moments that made him associate Eduardo with fire, with warmth, even in the middle of winter.  
  
  
  
Mark had always spent winter alone, outside. 

This was a nice change.  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
Mark went up to the Astronomy Tower one day, and Eduardo had followed, after coming back from the owlery (he had owled cupcakes to his mother, which Mark had watched him bake in the common room).

"It's freezing out here," Eduardo said as they made it to the top.

"Professor Dumbledore was killed on this tower," Mark said.

Eduardo blinked, and then shivered. "That is certainly the most comforting response to a comment about abysmal weather."

Mark looked down at the horizon, ignoring Eduardo's sarcasm with deft. "I have this idea, Wardo." 

Eduardo smiled briefly at the nickname. "Yeah?" he said, rubbing his arms, for warmth. 

"I want to work in the Muggles' world," Mark said. "They have this thing called the Internet."

"A... fishing net?"

Mark eyed Eduardo, feeling impatient, but only mildly. "It connects people from across the globe. A virtual platform where people can interact on, instantly, without moving from their desks."

"That's... without magic?"

"Yeah."

"Shit."

"I know. Closest thing we have are owls and Protean charms, but the internet is still a whole other league."

Eduardo rubbed his hands together.

Mark turned to look at him. "I want to build something on it. A website--"

"Wasn't it a net?" Eduardo asked.

"It'd be easier if I could just show you," Mark said.

"Right," Eduardo murmured, then, looking down at his legs, said, "I can't feel my legs."

"I know, I'm totally psyched about it too," Mark responded, looking into the horizon, feeling adrenaline coursing through his blood. And then, with something like hope and fear stuck in his throat, he admitted, "I would need some help."

He could feel Eduardo turn to study him. 

Mark closed his eyes, counting the after-images of stars behind his eyelids, counting the times he'd been rejected in his life.

And then Eduardo finally said, "okay, Mark."

Mark wondered if Eduardo could possibly know how much those two words really meant, to someone like him.  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
Winter passed. People stayed away from Eduardo too, solely because he hung out with Mark. The once popular Hufflepuff Keeper was now and quite officially, a nobody. Mark tried to shake Eduardo off (out of guilt, out of fear that his magic would hurt Eduardo, out of this strange feeling of companionship that he didn't think indulging would be good in the long-term), but Eduardo wouldn't have it. He stuck to Mark, followed him even more than Mark's shadow did.  
  
  
  
They were walking in the hallway on the seventh floor one spring day. 

Mark ran his hand across the stone wall, opposite of the tapestry of Barnabas the Barmy teaching trolls ballet. At one point when he wasn't looking, his hand came into contact with sand, and before he knew it, the door had appeared.

They stepped in.

The Room was filled with Muggle-style furniture, placed in a cosy, homely way. Armchairs, sofas, a wooden table, twelve chairs. Except they were all covered with cream-coloured drapes; a contrast against the dark, scorched walls.

Eduardo approached a tall lamp. When his fingers touched the drape, it slipped off quietly. "This is a Muggle lamp, isn't it?" he said, tapping the glass lightbulb under the shade.

"Yeah," Mark answered, but otherwise kept his gaze low, his muddled thoughts at bay. He didn't want to look around the room anymore. The familiarity, the nostalgia that hit him was hard to bear.

He could feel Eduardo eye him for a moment, sensing Mark's unease. But after a few seconds, he took a step closer to a desk. It was covered, but there was the unmistakable shape of a computer on top of it.

"We have everything we need, don't we?" Eduardo asked, carefully.

War had turned the Room into something more than that.

This was the first floor plan of the Muggle orphanage Mark grew up in.  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
Eduardo only asked about it a few days later. "The war changed the room too, didn't it?"

Mark was under the desk, trying to get the electric cords in order, for the computer. His magic kept disrupting the current, so he had to work around that, sometimes even from scratch.

He looked up at Eduardo when Eduardo cleared his throat. 

Mark stared blankly for a few seconds, and then, remembering something he read in a book, asked, "did you know someone died engulfed in Fiendfyre here?"

Eduardo grimaced, incredulous. "What?"

"Some Slytherin," Mark said.

Eduardo bit his lower lip. "Okay. That explains the black walls," he remarked.

Mark shrugged. "Yeah," and then, without preamble, "this was the living room of the Muggle orphanage I grew up in."

"What?"

"This was the living room of the orphanage--"

"But why--" Eduardo looked flustered.

"War," Mark said, and then, eyeing Eduardo, added, "we keep thinking back on it, don't we? The past. Magic does too. I guess."

Eduardo stood silently for a while. "Is that why you--"

"If we can combine magic and electricity together... then maybe we could move on," Mark said, firmly.

Eduardo nodded, and the windows of the Room swung wide open with a gust of wind, linen curtains floating - as if to say something. As if to agree.  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
On Eduardo's birthday, someone jinxed his ink to overflow and taint his things black. 

For months Mark's magic had been tame and subdued. But after that prank, it became ... easily irritable, so much that he couldn't work in the Room, and had to attend extra Magic Control classes with Professor McGonagall. (And if he sent a few students to the hospital wing, well, he didn't want to talk about it, nor did he even acknowledge it.)

"Did you take my wand?" Eduardo had asked once, when Mark came back from one of his sessions with Professor McGonagall.

Mark produced Eduardo's wand from his sleeve, handing it back, "yeah."

Professor McGonagall was teaching him to focus his magic into a wand, and he had misplaced his a long time ago.

Eduardo studied his wand, and then Mark, thoughtful. "My father tried to take my wand once," he said, and after a heavy pause, he added, "it splintered his arm."

Mark looked up at Eduardo wearily. "I guess we're alike, your wand and I."

"You certainly have the emotional range of one," Eduardo said, laughing.  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
Eduardo's wand cooperated with Mark most times. It would let him use Lumos, some Invisibility Spells for after-curfew excursions. It would understand him even if Mark didn't speak a word.

On one such excursions, they were going back to the dorm from the Room, only to discover a door they'd never seen before.

It opened up to an empty room, with a large medieval mirror sat in the middle, meditating under moonlight.

"It's broken," Eduardo said.

Mark reached out, but there wasn't any reflection. 

War had changed it too.

Shadows flitted in its fragments. 

"Do you see anything?" Eduardo asked.

"No," Mark said, and then he waited, expecting Eduardo to say that he couldn't see anything too.

Except Eduardo didn't.

He looked at it like he had just seen a ghost.  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
Mark worked on the computer, but it was a fruitless task because of his magic, and the castle's magic, and just magic in general too. Eduardo, on the other hand, had been far quieter than usual.

One afternoon while they studied in the library, Mark had thought about asking, but couldn't bring himself to. Eduardo was reading another baking recipe book, which was indication enough that he was upset.

What had he seen in the mirror?

Mark's magic prickled with curiosity, and the books around them groaned in their sleep.

What had he seen that Mark couldn't see?  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
It was when there were only two months left before the end of the year that Mark finally asked.

Eduardo softened his expression, smiled sadly.

They were walking along the Wooden Bridge that connected the courtyard and a gazebo. It had been destroyed during the war, and rebuilt, like many other things were. And like everything else, it was never the same again.

Some people said it would sway. People lost their footing and had dizzy spells after walking through it, especially on cloudy days.

"It was just my dad," Eduardo said. "At a platform. Leaving," a pause, "he goes on a lot of business trips. I don't see him much."

"Was he strict?" Mark asked.

"No," Eduardo answered. "Just... distant. Absent."

Mark looked out from the bridge, at the mountains. They were much further than they actually appeared, but sometimes he felt like he could touch them.

"I haven't seen him since before the war," Eduardo said. "He was in America. He stayed there - they had blocked all paths and owls to and from England. You know, because of V... they were afraid of V..."

"Voldemort," Mark said.

"Yeah," Eduardo said uneasily.

They stayed quiet, pensive, for a few moments.

"Your father was supposed to be back. Last Christmas," Mark said, finally understanding why Eduardo had been crying the first time they had met.

Eduardo bit his lower lip. "Yeah."

It started raining; the tip tap of drops on the roof over them grew steadily harder.

The bridge swayed lightly, like a rocking crib.

"I'm dropping out," Mark informed, holding onto the edge.

Eduardo didn't say anything, so Mark turned back to look at him.

Eduardo didn't look surprised.

He mostly looked lonely - the kind when people tried to be happy for someone else, even though their heart was breaking.  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
Mark was going to go to America, where dreams like his had a fighting chance, where people and buildings weren't afraid of his kind of magic. 

He was going to get a flat in New York, find both a Muggle and Wizard's job, find a way to connect magic and the Internet. 

And then he was going to connect wizards from across the globe.

So people like Eduardo could see their father whenever they wanted to. 

So people like Eduardo could see their mother's face more clearly than logs in a fireplace.

So people like Mark didn't feel so much like an in-between. 

So people like Mark could feel like they belonged.  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
Professor McGonagall had held his cheeks between her hands and looked at him fondly, like he was her grandchild, and for a few moments, Mark had felt scared. But she pulled him into a hug, and said, "good luck, Mark Zuckerberg," and he felt just a little better, a little surer that this was his path, the right path.

But he couldn't help it, feeling a little small too. He was leaving for the unknown. He was leaving everything behind. The safe embrace of a magical world licking its wounds from the war. He was leaving familiar people; people who did actually care about him, people his magic wasn't afraid of, people who weren't afraid of his magic too.  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
Eduardo was nowhere to be seen for days.

The Room of Requirement was empty. The Bridge was sealed because the weather was too windy. The room with the broken mirror never came back.

So Mark spent his last few days staring at the books in the library.

And then on the day he planned to leave, he walked into the fifty-sixth row, wanting to sit at its windowsill one last time.

And Eduardo was there.  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
"Mark," Eduardo said.

Mark had never felt like crying more than he did now, and that was saying a lot, because all his life he had been homeless, unwanted, alone. There was something stuck in his chest, and it hurt a little too much.

Eduardo stood up, took hesitant steps before resorting to more confident strides, his gaze never leaving Mark.

And before Mark knew what was going on, Eduardo grabbed him by the arm and leaned down to press his lips against Mark's.

Mark gasped in surprise; some books toppled from the shelves, and Eduardo flinched, almost backing away, but before he could take a full step back, Mark was pulling him back and kissing him firmly.

Shadows of raindrops on the windowpane appeared on the carpeted floor. Mark's magic hummed at the back of his mind, appeased.

In that moment, Mark had hoped time would cease, and that they could stay, that he could have this.

"I didn't want to hold you back," Eduardo said in between huffs, when they finally broke apart.

Mark nodded, though he wasn't sure what for. He closed his eyes, and let Eduardo cup his face.

"My father has some Muggle money. A lot--in fact. He said you could take some. He would invest in you. He likes your idea. He-- he says you can get an apartment in New York, and then pay him back when you can. Only when you can. And when I graduate--" Eduardo's voice cracked, "that's next year - only one year. I'll go-- I'll go there too. I want to be there too. I want-- I--"

Mark smiled sadly. "I know," he said. And then: "you remember that first time up Astronomy Tower?"

"Yeah," Eduardo said. "Of course."

Mark lowered his gaze. "I'll pay you back for everything. And more. And I'll wait for you."

Eduardo pulled Mark into an embrace. His nose was in Mark's curls, his arms around his torso.  
  
  
  
  
After a few moments, when Eduardo had finally gathered himself, he said, "okay, Mark."  
  
  
  
(Two words that meant the world.)  
  
  
  
(And Mark closed his eyes, recalled things past and present, thought about what it was like when he had been a lonely homeless Mudblood, wandering the streets, only to realise he couldn't really remember, not for the life of him. Not anymore.)

**Author's Note:**

> Thank you for reading! Would love to know your thoughts! Comments seriously make my day.


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